Red Dwarf X: Laugh Track

This is the latest preview of the upcoming Red Dwarf season (season ten):

There is a lot of debate in the YouTube comments about whether the laughter is genuine from a studio audience or added in post. Personally, I think it’s interesting that they added a laugh track at all considering there wasn’t one in the previous series (partially because so much was filmed on location instead of a studio). Personally, I thought not having a laugh track in season nine ruined the whole series. I’ve also watched versions of previous seasons without the laugh track (you can select to turn it off on the DVD), and it’s significantly less funny. This makes me wonder about the nature of laugh tracks. It’s not that we don’t know it’s funny if people aren’t laughing, but maybe you’re more open to laugh if other people (even invisible people inside your TV) are laughing? What do you think? Leave thoughts in comments.

To address whether this laughter is genuine, I’d bet that it is genuine because this season was filmed in front of a live audience. I’m not saying they didn’t sweeten it, but as someone who has gone to live shows, I know that they coach the audience and have someone there warming them up so that they laugh louder and more often than they would if they were sitting at home.

Red Dwarf X will be a full season and launches Oct. 4 on Dave (a channel in the UK).